If 2016 is supposed to be a three-way fight between defending champion Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes AMG F1 teammate Nico Rosberg and Ferrari challenger Sebastian Vettel, Scuderia Ferrari has some catching up to do. Despite a strong showing in the Australian Grand Prix itself, the team has been well behind Mercedes in qualifying in both Bahrain and Melbourne, and while a podium for Vettel in Australia was enough to ensure that the competition from Mercedes stays within his sights while the team works on updates to their 2016 car, today leaves Rosberg and, to a lesser extent, Hamilton separating themselves already.

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On the formation lap, Vettel's engine failed dramatically. The driver that qualified third did not start, recording no points on a night that the only three drivers who can conceivably finish ahead of him in the standings if the current balance-of-power lasts through season's end finished 1-2-3. In other words, just two races into the season, he's already more a full race worth of points behind championship leader Nico Rosberg and would need to win five races in which Rosberg finishes second to so much as tie for the series lead again.

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The day started fairly poorly for polesitter Lewis Hamilton, too. One corner into the race, Hamilton had already made contact with Williams driver Valtteri Bottas (who was awarded a drive-through penalty for his part in the incident), pushing him down to 7th and immediately leaving him well behind teammate Nico Rosberg. He would recover to third by the end of the second cycle of tire changes, a position he'd hold for a weekend-salvaging finish to a potentially disastrous day.

The issues for contenders Hamilton and Vettel left the door open to their teammates, and while Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen put in a respectable drive to stay within ten seconds of Rosberg, the German ace faced little resistance on his way to what has suddenly become a very impressive win streak. His fifth win puts him in pretty special territory, as each of the seven drivers to record five-race winning streaks before him would win the World Driver's Championship in the season they took win number five. While he's needed some fortuitous Lewis Hamilton mistakes and issues to grab some of those wins, Rosberg has still proven that he can, at least on occasion, take the fight to his superstar teammate, and if he can bring out the speed he had today more often than not, this could be his championship season.

All of the pre-race and lap-one drama left room in the top ten for unexpected point scorers, and while Renault found themselves just one position out of scoring their first points since returning to the sport for the second Grand Prix in a row, other teams and drivers had reasons to celebrate. Stoffel Vandoorne, filling in for Fernando Alonso, would score a single point on his McLaren (and Formula 1) debut, the lone finisher for the Honda-powered team after Jenson Button retired just eight laps into the race with yet another mechanical issue. Max Verstappen took a strong Toro Rosso to sixth, one spot ahead of Daniil Kvyat in one of the top team Red Bulls. Not to be outdone, Romain Grosjean got his Ferrari-powered Haas F1 racer all the way up to fifth, his second consecutive finish deep in the points-awarding positions.

Formula 1's next Grand Prix is two weeks away, to be run at China's Shanghai International Circuit.